High-grade
by Draikinator
Summary: Bee and Blades share a moment on Cybertron after the restoration while everyone else is celebrating. I am in gay robot hell and you are all coming with me.


I'm trapped in robot hell

I've shotgunned 20 episodes of Rescue Bots in the last three days, and like 20 issues of MTMTE and just. so much robots. Anyway I hit episode 18 of RB with bumblebee and i lost my mind, that was literally the cutest shit I have ever seen and I love it. I want like, a million fo that episode thank. please appreciate the crappy bee/blades drabble fic i did today. :)

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><p>"Hey, Blades. Crowd too much for you?" Bee settled down next to the helicopter, who was sitting at the edge of the roof on the council chamber in Upper Kaon, the dull sounds of celebration still thundering, muffled, beneath him.<p>

Blades looked back, both hands on an energon cube and surprise in his eyes.

"Ah! Bumblebee, oh, I'm sorry, you didn't need to check on me. I'm fine." He shifted nervously, drawing his legs back up over the side from which they had been dangling absently.

"Nah, party was a bit much for me, too. Wheeljack's high-grade has never done me any favours," he laughed, twirling a syringe of glittering cyan energon in his servos. Blades crinkled his optic ridges in confusion, and Bee's optics dilated, confused, before spinning back open.

"Ah. Oh, this?" Bee said, stopping the motion and holding the needle up.

"You're not sick, are you…?" Blades asked, and Bee laughed, before jabbing himself in main energon line in his left arm casually.

"Nah. To tell you the truth," he said, pushing the plunger down and the energon into the line, "I've been doing it this way for so long, I'm worried that if I try to drink it like a normal bot with a mouth, I'll just end up spilling it everywhere."

Blades tightened his grip on his cube, embarrassed. He hadn't meant to bring the conversation in that direction- even if Bee had gotten his voicebox back, an injury like that was still a sensitive topic.

"Well," Blades said after a moment, "I really just came out to look at the stars. Earth's stars are really pretty, but I missed the stars here on Cybertron."

Bee nodded, stashing the syringe in an arm compartment, "I know what you mean. It's good to be home."

There was a beat where they both just watched the stars twinkle over Kaon peacefully.

"You know, I'm actually older than you?" Blades blurted out suddenly, twisting the cube nervously in his hand. Bee raised his optic ridges.

"That so? I figured you were a last waver, like me."

Blades shook his head, "I was actually a couple of decades when the war started. I used to be a grounder," he said, twitching his rotors, "I was actually- well, I was a nurse, I guess. Never really had time to actually train or anything, and then the war started, and I got stationed in a triage facility and ended up as mostly a gopher…" He trailed off thoughtfully.

Bee smirked, a little sadly, "Ah. Okay, I see what you're getting at. You know, Optimus-" his face changed, sobering, before his optics whirled low, "Optimus said that you guys missed most of the war in stasis. I was _wondering_ how you knew about my voicebox."

Blades nodded, twirling the box a little bit faster than he really should, servos twitching uncomfortably as he ran his fingers over the corners idly.

"I mean, I was just an intern, but they dragged you in there bleeding and- and- well. A lot of the other workers liked to bet- on when- wehn people would _die_," he shuttered his optics, squeezing the cube, missing the look of concern Bee gave him, "and I never got involved with that stuff, because I didn't_ like_ it, but nobody thought you would make it. You were _way_ too injured. And by _Meg-_" his voice dropped to a staticy whisper, "Megatron. But you did. You shouldn't have, but you did."

He unshuttered his optics suddenly, realizing what he'd said, "Oh, no! Wait, no, I didn't mean- I don't think you should have d- die- I didn't-"

"It's fine," Bee cut him off, gesturing 'calm down' with his servos gently, "You're right. Ratchet doesn't like talking about it, but I mean- I woke up with half my head missing, you know? You're right," he sighed, "I really don't have any excuse for surviving."

Blades nodded, swallowing heavily.

"I just. I replaced most of the medbags, you know, and every day I'd see all these mechs wandering around, half offline and acting like we'd already_ lost_, and there you were. Half your- your head, gone," he stumbled over the words and took a quick gulp of high-grade, "And swearing up and down in broken Universal Tones that you'd kill Megatron yourself." He laughed.

Bee sat back with a smirk, "And I did."

Blades smiled, finally.

"Yeah, you did."

Another beat.

"You were kind of always my hero," Blades said finally, following the words with a quick gulp of liquid courage, casting his optics back up at the stars like he was paying attention to them.

"I was a hotshot," Bee laughed after a long moment, "And an idiot."

"Hey! Bee, we're gonna go tear down the Decepticon propaganda in Lower! Wanna come with?" Smokescreen's voice called up from street level, four floors below them, obviously slurred with static and probably too much high grade. Bee leaned over the side, before looking back at Blades, who shook his head.

"Go on," he whispered, "I'm gonna spend some more time here with the stars."

Bee nodded, and waved down to Smokescreen, "No thanks! Too much of Wheeljack's stash for me. I'm not good to drive. Tell Bulkhead to wreck one for me, though!"

Blades looked startled, and Smokescreen's whine floated back up.

"Awww. That's no fun, Bee. We'll bring you back one of those ugly Ratbat statues, I wanna see you blast its head off!"

Bee rolled his optics as Blades heard the telltale sound of Smokescreen's noisy engine speeding off with a clumsy shriek.

"You didn't have to do that," Blades said quietly.

Bee shrugged absently, but he smiled, looking back at the constellations.

"They still look different," Bee sighed after a moment, "Some of the stars have died. Look-" Bee pointed to a small cluster of stars, "Last time I was here, that constellation was shaped like a Predacon. It's missing the head, now."

Blades crushed the empty cube in his hand with a jerk, optics widening, "Died? It's been that long?"

Bee's optic ridges rose again, "How long were you in stasis?"

"Long enough for the chronometer to burn out," Blades sighed, "I guess in dynamic ages, you are a _lot_ older than me, then."

Bee laughed, "Yeah, probably by a couple thousand years."

Blades grimaced.

"I wouldn't worry about it," he continued with a laugh, "Smokescreen's in the same boat."

Blades laughed, "Oh, no, please don't tell me I remind you of Smokescreen!"

Bee laughed along, "Primus, no. You're nothing like him. He's a good 'bot, but he's_ still_ so headstrong. You seem to actually have a handle on yourself, most of the time."

Blades smiled nervously, "Ah- thank you."

Bee grinnedback, and Blades thought to himself that it was a nice smile- especially for not having practiced it in the last few eons. Oddly warm for the unusually static faceplate he wore. Something that didn't quite fit with the stories of the battle-ready-scout-turned-pseudo-leader, the sparkling who had withstood Megatron's torture, the soldier who had shoved a blade through Megatron's sparkchamber.

Blades really, really liked it.

"Do you, uh, do you think I might pick up my medical training, er, again?" He said, trying to shake the thoughts from his head. Bee frowned, and Blades definitely didn't like that.

"Maybe. Ratchet's in no shape to teach anyone anything right now-" Bee looked mournful, "Other than Raf, I guess, who he's practically _kidnapped._ Won't even let me go racing with him…" He mumbled, "And _honestly_, I'm _afraid_ of what Knockout might try to teach you."

"Mm," it was Blades turn to grimace, "Yeah, I met him. He owns almost as many Earth movies as I do- I was going to trade some with him, but he told me he once reenacted the Saw movies in his medbay." He shifted uncomfortably and cast Bee an uneasy look, "Dani told me not to watch those movies, but I did anyway. She was right, I shouldn't have."

Bee sighed, "Yeah. Not all humans have the nicest ideas…" He drifted off, some other place and time, "Probably puts Knockout in the same boat as Ratchet, even if he won't talk about it. Ah- he was probably kidding, about that. Probably."

"Why, of _course_ I was kidding. I'm an Autobot, and an Autobot would _never _do something like _that_."

Blades dropped the crushed cube he'd been toying with right over the side of the building when he heard Knockout's voice behind him, who laughed at the startled movement. Blades hadn't even heard the door open.

"Knockout! Primus- what is _wrong_ with you? What do you want?" Bee snapped irritably.

Knockout leaned off the doorframe to the stairs, pedes dragging a bit dully, "My favourite bug was missing from the shindig! I just wanted to make sure you were _safe,_" he purred with a pout, sitting himself down between them. Blades shifted uncomfortably away quickly, but Bee just frowned sourly.

"Go _away_, Knockout."

"No," Knockout half sang, and tossed a cube of energon at him. Bee caught it in one servo, then looked at it, startled, like it had been an accident.

Blades noted he had not been brought a cube.

Bee sighed and set the cube down beside him.

"Primus, you _really_ know how to kill a moment, don't you?"

Blades straightened up immediately. A moment?

"One of my specialties, fellow _Autobot,_" he sighed, and swallowed an entire cube of high-grade. Blades immediately felt out of his comfort zone and wondered if he should leave. "But I'm nothing if not accommodating," Knockout continued, swinging an arm around Bumblebee, who sighed loudly, "I would just _looove_ to take the sparkling on as an apprentice."

"I am _not_ a sparkling!" Blades blurted out, jumping to his pedes, feeling brave for a moment, "And I don't want to be _your_ apprentice!" The moment passed, but he pretended it hadn't. Knockout sideeyed him in a way he found oddly dangerous, despite the friendly demeanor he was displaying.

"Class changing doesn't make you a grown-up, sparky."

Blades swallowed, gritting his denta, but didn't respond. Bee shoved Knockout's arm off him.

"Alright, KO, I think you've had enough."

Knockout pushed himself up, wobbling back and away with a grunt, "_Fine,_ be that way. _Not_ like I need an assistant _anyway_." He stumbled a few feet toward the door, then turned, "And I _hate_ helicopters!" He moved back towards the door, but his pointed, trembling servos slipped messily on the handle, unable to find purchase. He settled for just kicking at it rather violently, and Bee jerked to his pedes, moving toward him.

"Alllllright, let's get you back to a berth." He pulled Knockout off of the now dented door, and glanced back at Blades, "Just- don't go anywhere, okay? I'll be right back. Don't leave." Bee said, and slipped through the door with the red grounder, who was yelling about how untrustworthy fliers were anyway, and how he was much more efficient without the distraction of someone in his lab anyway.

They left Blades in near silence, other than the now quieting sounds of celebration below. Happy New Cybertron day.

He hiked up his shoulders, twitching his pedes against the side of the wall beneath him. _Sparkling._ He'd called him a _sparkling._ _Of course_ they would think of him as a _sparkling_. He had a few dynamic centuries under him, but that was _nothing_ compared to the thousands- if not _millions_ of years these 'bots had survived. His servos clenched at his sides. They'd each left _scores_ of enemies in their wake, battle hardened soldiers who had all _seen_ and _done_ things they knew he couldn't even _understand_.

And _he_ didn't even like _swearing._

He stood back up on the ledge and stretched his rotors. Better to cut his losses and go than embarrass himself further. He had been _stupid_ to think Bumblebee- _the_ Bumblebee- could ever like him in any real way. He had been _stupid_ to tell him about the triage facility. Honestly, he didn't even _belong_ on Cybertron, no one on this planet really even _wanted_ him here- dynamically the youngest, and _absolutely_ the most inexperienced- he got _queasy_ at the sight of spilled energon, for Primus sake! He didn't belong here, among these mechs and their war stories- he should just fly back to the spacebridge and take the first jump to Earth- to Dani, and Cody, and Griffin Rock and the humans that could actually use his help, and-

That was when he was yanked backward off the ledge and onto his back with a startled yelp.

"What the absolute _scrap_ do you think you're _doing_?!" Bee yelled, pinning him down, but Blades was too stunned and confused to respond with anything more than a confused wet static noise. "Do you have any idea how many people we- _I_ lost in the war? And now that it's over, you- you want to- you only had _a cube_ of high grade, and you're going to- _to_-" He looked more upset than angry, but he was still definitely angry, stuttering near nonsense, eyebrow rides deepening, optics spiraling to tiny pinpricks.

"Wha-?" Blades started, trying to scrabble backwards, before it clicked, "Oh! You thought I was going to-" he started, then dropped his optic ridges down, offended, "You thought I was going to _jump_?! My alt mode is a _helicopter_! I was going to _fly_! _Away_!"

Bee opened his mouth to say something, then promptly snapped it shut, optics spiraling wide. There was a long, tense moment before he just said, "Oh," dumbly, and stood up.

Blades picked himself back up, wiping himself off. Bee was standing awkwardly to the side, rubbing his servos together and staring at the ground.

And now they were both uncomfortable.

"I, uh," Bee started, lamely, his doorwings sinking, "I'm sorry about Knockout. And tackling you. And- actually, no, you're right, I've kinda ruined this. I'll just let you go, then, Primus, sorry," he said, raising his servos apologetically and swiveling on a pede toward the door, doorwings jerking up over his shoulders and hiding his faceplate as he turned.

"Ah! No, wait, please, don't go-" Blades said, reaching out instinctively and grabbing Bee by the servo.

There was a beat, and Bee's fingers curled around his.

"Yeah, okay."

The stars twinkled above, forgotten.


End file.
